Using media materials to set the stage for learning

In a recent issue of the newsletter The Teaching Professor, the lead article discusses how you can use media materials to help motivate and engage students and set the stage for deeper learning. The author describes how audio-visual materials and popular media can be used to stimulate discussion and interest in classes as diverse as business, humanities, nursing, mathematics, and engineering (Belolan, 2007).

It is now possible for instructors at FDU to use some kinds of media very easily in your classrooms. As you know, all of our classrooms have been equipped with overhead data projectors. We also now have a relationship with Films Media Group, allowing you to show many high-quality videos streamed over the internet into your classroom. To find our list of videos, visit the library’s CoolCatNJ page (online catalog) and enter “FMG” as a keyword search. You can show an entire video, pre-selected clips, or you can create your own clips. You can then show these films using the overhead data projector in your classroom, using your laptop to connect to the campus library. Kudos to the FDU Libraries, University Systems and Security, and NJEdge.net for making this resource available to our faculty.
The Belolan article is not available online. However you can come browse back issues of The Teaching Professor at the Instructional Design Studio located on the first floor of Dickinson Hall on the Metropolitan Campus.

Belolan, C. (2007). Using media materials to set the stage for learning – A strategy for all dsiciplines. The Teaching Professor, December 2007, pp. 1, 3.